Music to listen to while you read (unless you’re on mobile lmao):

Drawing is hard! It’s really hard!

Imagine looking at some “thing” and trying to replicate it on paper!

The paper is flat but the “things” aren’t flat!  

Pencils make lines!

Look around you, how many lines do you see???

and no matter how hard I try, it doesn’t look like the “THINGS” I have in my head!

DAMN THESE “THINGS”

It’s rough out here.

Maybe you were inspired by some renaissance painter or your favorite mangaka, maybe you want to create the world you have in your head or make fan art for the stuff you like. Regardless of your reasons to learn, You have a long journey ahead of you. of course, the style you wish to make will change the things you learn/practice, but the fundamentals (colour, composition, value, form, perspective, and other stuff) are unavoidable, and you’ll need to learn them eventually. One of the advantages of starting to draw later in life is that you’re able to learn the fundamentals first, giving yourself a solid foundation to improve faster and more effectively than someone who’s just been learning undirectedly since childhood.  

But the question is, how does one go about learning these nebulous “fundamentals”? With all the different resources online, it’s natural to feel some decision paralysis. But I found what I think is the best resource for people who’ve never drawn in their lives and wish to get started the right way. It’s the Lessons and Community at Drawabox. A Free Online art full fundamentals course.

But what makes Drawabox so special among all the art learning resources on the internet? why am I so confident in saying it’s the best? and do you really have an assignment where you draw 250 Boxes!? Everything will be explained in this blog post.

What’s Drawabox?

The Drawabox (abbreviated to DaB) curriculum consists of seven Lessons (Technically eight, considering there is a lesson zero) and five challenge assignments spaced in between. Each lesson is broken up into sections with lectures and homework, and the challenge assignments are like big pieces of homework. The first two Lessons are about the basics: how to make lines, form shapes, draw those shapes in perspective, and put them together to make things. The next five are about applying the skills you obtained in the first 2 lessons by drawing specific things: Animals, Cars… look on the site if you’re interested in the specifics. But the things that set DaB apart aren’t only within the content itself, but the philosophy in which the course and content are structured and created around.

Dab is about teaching you that drawing isn’t some inherent talent that people are born with or that you can only develop as a child. Drawing is a skill like any other, and with time, intentional practice, and proper dedication, you too can learn to draw.

But how does it do that?

What makes Drawabox so special?

1. Everything is done with fine liner pen.

This is a point of contention, but it’s important to the philosophy of DaB. DaB is all about drawing confidently and intentionally, making each mark count. Making your marks permanent and without the ability to make lighter underdrawings for you to go over, it forces you to think before you draw and make impactful and purposeful lines.

A line exercise is one of the first things you do in DaB

2. It treats you as if you’ve never held that pen in your life.

And honestly, you might as well have not, considering how different drawing with a pen is from writing with a pen. The first things you learn are the proper form to hold a pen for making marks on a page. It then goes into how to make said marks on the page. A lot of art resources skip to the “Fun stuff”, but DaB slowly and exhaustively teaches you everything you need to start.

Organic Intersections! a really fun exercise to practice organic bodies interacting with each other.

3. It forces you to fail.

The Iconic 50% rule of DaB states that only at least 50% of the time you spend drawing must be devoted to drawing purely for its own sake. This rule is the one that has the most significant impact on how you approach learning to draw, and if I could only teach someone one piece of the drawabox curriculum, this is what I’d pick.

It’s ingenious and applies to learning so many more things than just drawing. It allows you to practice applying what you’re learning, solving problems on your own, and reinforcing the understanding that the studies gave you. People will be afraid to draw on their own and have it go poorly, whether it’s from a sense of perfectionism, expectations from the way their studies look, or comparing themselves to others. The 50% is not negotiable, therefore it helps us realize that we’re burdened by our expectations, and ironically, simply drawing without concern for the finished product’s quality is how we’ll really improve. hat’s one of the most important things an artist can learn after all, to have fun drawing for drawing’s sake.

Starting lesson 3 onwards you use reference drawings to analyze and construct your drawings.

4. There is free and mandatory homework critique  

Criticism is very important for learning, you need to receive feedback for the work you do and get an idea of what you’re doing well, and what you need to spend more time trying to understand. Most free online art resources don’t provide critique systems, due to the free nature not making it sustainable. DaB solves this issue by having community members give critiques to each other.

I kinda gave up with the texture on the mushroom cap, still turned out well

You give criticisms of others’ work to earn credit to redeem criticisms of your work. There’s also the option to pay to receive official criticisms from the man behind the course, Irshad “Uncomfortable” Karim, or one of his teaching assistants. This is a great system, for multiple reasons, It solves the issue of not having enough people to give critiques, it helps develop a strong community of people who want to help their fellow artists, and giving criticisms is a strong way to help your own learning, as explaining problems that you have recently solved can help others understand in a way a master might not be fit to convey.

A Warm-up page of planes with ellipses drawn inside.

5. There’s a great community!

The discord community is huge and filled with people who will answer your questions and give you feedback on homework submissions (outside of the normal Lesson critique system). But a community is essential to keeping you dedicated to your art journey. DaB is a lot of work, and having an environment of people all working towards the same goal helps you keep focused and on track. It’s easier to walk the long path if you have other people with you, and making artist buddies is always fun! (any potential artist buddies reading this, hit me up 😳)

Form Intersections are a nightmare and turn your brain into mush trying to figure out how all the objects are positioned and interact in 3D space.

6. It’s HARD

…but difficulty is relative to whatever you’re comparing it to, right? I’m not saying that everyone is being hyperbolic when they claim that DaB is hard, it does ask you for a lot of complex construction, analysis, and decision making, but it’s just preparing you with the skills and knowledge you’ll be using when you draw. In that sense, DaB is as hard as drawing is, considering that’s what you’ll be asked to do. It does teach you a lot, and that could be a little overwhelming as a beginner, but nothing you can’t handle!

A taste of the madness. The coloured lines are to check if the lines are connecting to the vanishing point.

Yes, the 250 Box challenge in which you draw one box rotated in 3-D space and then repeat that 249 times, is assumedly a student killer. It comes right after Lesson 1, and it’s significantly more work than has been asked of you prior. However it’s not that much “harder”, it just takes time. You’ll get a good enough idea of how to draw the boxes pretty quickly, and it stays the same to the 250th. I took around 5-6 Minutes per box when I was in the groove, but it still took me about a month and a half from beginning to end. But trust me, you’ll wish drawing 250 boxes was the hardest DaB gets.

TEXTURES.

But what has it done for me?

well… see for yourself!

My old art (early 2021)

What I’m making now (2021-2022)

I used to suck! now I suck considerably less!? maybe one day, I might even be good!?

But what can it do for you?

If you’re someone who feels lost, confused or overwhelmed about starting to learn to draw, know that it’s a very normal thing to feel. I was in that position a year ago. Drawing is a lifelong endeavor and there’s no skipping the learning process (Because you never stop learning!) If you want to get started and are willing to trust the process, then DaB is something you should consider. Even if you have already been drawing for a while, DaB is still worth going through, as it can help solidify and teach you things you might not have been deliberately practicing.

The Lesson 0 videos recently got updated and are a good look at what’s in store for you if you chose to do DaB. Watch them, and if it seems like something you’d be interested in, give it a shot!

In conclusion, DaB is great 🙂

I’m not sure how to end this, considering it’s the first one I’ve ever written. Not every blog entry will be about drawing, I also want to talk about game development and design, web development stuff, music, and whatever I’m interested in and that I could convey interestingly. The blog itself is also subject to change. I picked this cms on a whim (I already changed it lmao) and I’m not too sure about how to format/structure a blog post. I’ll see what works and what doesn’t, and iterate from there. If you found this post interesting, send feedback! My email is yoush1337@gmail.com My Instagram is youbie_yoush, and if you go to york university, consider joining my game development club discord

That’s all for now, see ya!